NSA Surveillance Challenge Turned Away by U.S. Supreme Court

The U.S. Supreme Court declined to
take up a challenge to the National Security Agency’s telephone
data surveillance program, rejecting a call to put the dispute
on an unusual fast track.

The justices today turned away a petition by Larry Klayman,
a legal activist who persuaded a federal trial judge to say the
spying program probably violates constitutional privacy rights.

Although the Obama administration is asking a federal
appeals court in Washington to reverse that ruling, Klayman
argued that the issue was so urgent that the Supreme Court
needed to intervene without waiting for the appellate court.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon’s December ruling called
the NSA spying program “almost Orwellian.” The agency
systematically keeps years of phone records for hundreds of
millions of Americans.

Leon ordered the government to stop collecting data on the
calls of Klayman and another man, though the judge put the order
on hold while the case is on appeal.

The Obama administration didn’t respond to Klayman’s
request, and the high court didn’t ask for a reply. The Supreme
Court rarely takes up cases that haven’t first been considered
at an intermediate appellate level.